Snapshots
by coffeebuddha
Summary: Various 100 word drabbles focusing on Esposito and Ryan.
1. Chapter 1

**Just Once**

Ryan's back hits the table hard enough that several cartons of cold, congealing takeout food tip over onto the floor, and Esposito's right there. His head swims and it's like it's someone else doing this, but then Esposito's lips are hot against his skin and his hands are doing things, and there's alcohol on his tongue, on his partner's breath, and he holds on tighter, because he can, because he has an excuse. His phone rings in the next room-Jenny's ringtone-but he grabs Esposito by the ears and pulls him up for a kiss, murmuring against his mouth, "Not tonight."

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**Scarf**

It's thin and blue and it looks...waffley, Esposito decides after examining the scarf draped around Ryan's neck. It's knitted, probably handmade considering some of its more interesting lumps and holes. It's blue, the same deep, warm blue as Ryan's eyes when he laughs. He's laughing into his cell phone now. Esposito doesn't think he notices him. "I am so wearing it," he says into the phone, his tone light and teasing. A pause, then, "I love you, too. I'll see you at home tonight."

Ryan looks warm all bundled up in his scarf, and suddenly all Esposito feels is cold.

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**Domesticity  
**

Thick smoke billows out of the oven. Ryan doesn't know where to look first and ends up just gaping blankly at Esposito as he scrambles for the fire extinguisher. The fire goes out easily enough, but the smoke hangs in the air and stings Ryan's eyes even after Esposito forces the tiny window open. Ryan shakes himself while Esposito prods cautiously at an inedible lasagna. There's foam from the extinguisher on his nose and soot on his cheeks and an apron around his waist, and Ryan grins, tickled by the absurdity of it. When Esposito notices and glares, he laughs.

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**Thank you for reading! Feedback is overwhelmingly appreciated.**

Disclaimer: Nothing belongs to me.

Written to answer prompts from the castle100 comm on LJ.


	2. Chapter 2

**Snow**

The flakes fall slowly in fat, lazy clumps that stick to their clothes and hair. They catch on Ryan's eyelashes and he shakes his head and rubs at his eyes with snow crusted gloves. When that only makes things worse, he turns to Esposito with an almost helpless laugh. Esposito takes Ryan's freezing face in his gloveless hands and gently wipes at his eyes. Another flake lands on the tip of Ryan's red nose, and his eyes cross in an attempt to see it. Esposito leans in and kisses it, smiling at Ryan as the snow melts on his tongue.******  
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**********Ex**

Jenny waits across the street from Kevin's apartment. She needs to see him. Needs to fix things, fix _them__. _She lurches forward when she sees him round the corner, but then he disappears behind a crowd and when he reappears Esposito is by his side. Jenny pauses, her foot on the curb, and watches them. Notices the way their heads are bent together, the casual touches, the private smiles, the tiny bubble of isolation surrounding them so completely. Her breath catches in her throat, and when Esposito follows Kevin through his building's front door, she stumbles back and numbly leaves.**********  
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**************Chocolate Kisses  
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Ryan tastes sweet like summer days from Esposito's childhood when the hydrants would gush water and sticky drops from a melting fudgesicle would run down his fingers to pool in his palm and drip onto his shorts. He tastes like winter nights when the air was so crisp and sharp that it would steal his breath and the kitchen was always filled with people and flavor and huge mugs of cocoa that would scald your tongue even if you blew on it first. He tastes of almost forgotten memories and sinful temptation and safety and danger, and Esposito wants more.

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**************Thank you for reading! Feedback is overwhelmingly appreciated.**


	3. Chapter 3

**Secrets**

He didn't know. How could he have? There was never any hint, any indication. Not until Castle and his bets and that kiss. But when Ryan squares his shoulders, throws one last glare over his shoulder at a preening Castle, and crosses the break room to take Esposito's face in his hands and kiss him, Esposito lets him. Everything's warm and soft and wet, and Esposito's fingertips touch his cheek-a mere whisper of a caress-but he doesn't pull away. And when Ryan does, Esposito looks stunned and surprised and _happy_, and Ryan feels like complete scum because he didn't _know_.

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**********Handcuffs**

Esposito doesn't realize his handcuffs are missing until he reaches for them and comes up empty. Back at the precinct, he tears through his desk and locker. He finds a letter from his grandmother, a dull shark's tooth, fifteen dollars, and a grape lollipop, but no handcuffs. Finally, he turns to Ryan and exclaims, "Where did they _go_?"

And Ryan, with a completely smooth face that does nothing to betray the fact that his wrists are still a little red and raw under his shirt sleeves, looks him straight in the eye and calmly says, "Maybe they're on your nightstand."

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**Time Travel****************  
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The world starts to spin funny every time Ryan kisses Esposito. It's the only explanation he can think of for the way time fluctuates when they're together. Their lips brush and the clock ticks slower. A single slide of Esposito's tongue against his and they're whipping around the sun so fast that they should fly off the earth's surface. Every moment stretches into an eternity when he grazes his teeth over Esposito's lower lip, and his heartbeat rivals a hummingbird's when Esposito gasps against his mouth. Ryan's always believed in time travel, but he never thought it'd be like this.

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**************Thank you for reading! Feedback is overwhelmingly appreciated.**


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